MINICOMPUTER GIVES FAST TURNAROUND FOR FLUOROMETRY.

Excellent selectivity and sensitivity have led to the routine use of fluorescence spectroscoy in the analysis of a wide variety of samples in diverse fields. But in conventional fluorometry, these advantages have not been fully realized because spectral interferences necessitate preseparation and sample clean-up. This special handling inevitably leads to loss and contamination of the materials being determined. To remedy this shortcoming and to enhance fluorescence measurements as a multicomponent analytical technique, a video fluorometer has been developed incorporating a novel polychromatic illumination technique and a two-dimensional detection scheme using an imaging device. In addition, a computer has been dedicated to a commercial fluorometer to provide the two-dimensional data format of the video fluorometer at a much slower rate. Handling of video fluorometer data by a mainframe computer is slow and awkward. Use of a dedicated minicomputer permits instrument design for rapid data deconvolution